Field of Invention
Embodiments of the invention relate generally to automata processors, and more specifically, to reducing array size and complexity in automata processors.
Description of Related Art
Certain apparatuses, such as computational electronic devices and systems, may include a number of processing resources (e.g., one or more processors), which may retrieve and execute instructions and store the results of the executed instructions to a suitable location. For example, the processing resources may include a number of functional units, arithmetic units, and similar circuitry to execute instructions by performing a number of Boolean logical operations and arithmetic functions. One particular processing resource may include an automata-based processing resource, which may be suitable for use in applications such as, for example, network security, computational biology, image processing, text searching, and so forth. These automata-based processing resources, may include, or may be described for example, by a number of state elements and signal transitions among these state elements. Each state element of the automata-based processing resources may store and/or recognize one/a number of particular data value. Using automata processor to identify (e.g., search for or match) signal patterns may lead to overly complex arrays of state elements and state transitions, and, by extension, an inefficient use of system resources (e.g., processing power, physical area, processing speed, and so forth). It may be useful to provide devices and methods to increase processing and performance efficiency of automata-based processing resources.